Jackie Update

Thank you to everyone who has commented on the blogs and also emailed. I genuinely appreciate knowing people are thinking about my brother and our family at this time.

Here's the update...

Short version - it's good news so far.

Long version:
They have him on some medication to make his heart contract and they are weaning him off that and his heart is contracting on its own.
Neither the heart pump nor the temp pacemaker have had to kick in - his heart has been working on its won.
He responds to verbal commands - move leg, twitch toe, etc.
This afternoon he wrote a note to communicate. This really made me feel good - his brain was working well enough to form thoughts and he could write - that all seemed like great news to me.
He had a tube down his throat so couldn't talk. They've had him restrained because he kept trying to take it out whenever he would rouse from the sedation at all. They planned to take it out tomorrow. Tonight about 7:30 one of his hands was free by accident and he pulled the tube out. His blood oxygen level has been good so they haven't put it back down. Hopefully that will continue.
The nurse said she wasn't sure about it yesterday - if he would make it through the night - but that today he is on track for how people recovery from a stent surgery.
He has a little bit of pneumonia in one lung but that's not abnormal in such a circumstance and they're giving him some antibiotics for that.
He recognizes all the family and has talked to them, as much as he can. Obviously, his throat is very sore from the tube being down it.

I felt better about things this morning when Jim (my other brother) went to see him and told me that Jackie didn't look too bad. Jim has had a heart attack and knows what people look like in such a circumstance, so I found that comforting.

Cathy has done a great job calling me everytime they've heard even a little bit of news. I am so thankful for that. I was planning to go to KY this coming weekend for Mary Ann and Jackie's 50th Anniversary Party - obviously, we're going to postpone that for a little bit. Now I'm not sure when I'm going. There are lots of people there at the moment so I can probably be more useful later during the recovery phase. We'll see. I'm just so relieved things are going as well as they are.

Overall, things seem to be going pretty well at the moment. The 48 hour mark will pass early tomorrow afternoon. We are all eager to get past that milestone.

Thank you, again, for all your good thoughts and prayers for Jackie and my family. Please continue to remember us. I will update things here. Thank you.

Your Prayers and Good Energy Requested

I'm asking for your good thoughts and prayers for my brother, Jackie.

Jackie fell the other day when he was working on a construction job and broke his leg. He fell about 10 feet when a board he was standing on broke. It broke the ball off his hip and he had surgery this morning.

They did a full hip replacement and it went very smoothly.

But, while he was in recovery he had a heart attack. They took him into surgery and had to shock him 8-10 times to restart his heart. The next 24-48 hours are critical,  but his vitals are good. My big worry is about how long he was without oxygen. Obviously, we're all very concerned.

So, your good energy would be appreciated. Thanks.

Christmas Cards

I got started on my Christmas cards tonight. Well, I've already been thinking about the letter, but tonight I signed the cards, so they'll be ready to insert.

OK, close your gaping mouth and stop pretending like I'm off my rocker for doing this in October. I'm a little late for my tastes. Do you think of the Christmas season as starting the day after Thanksgiving? Well, lots of folks do. And... news flash... Thanksgiving is SEVEN WEEKS FROM TODAY.

Yes, Thanksgiving is seven weeks from today. That's seven Saturdays, four of which are already committed to other things in my little world. So, it's time for me to be preparing for Christmas.

I don't like rushing around during the holiday season. I like to just enjoy the holidays. I don't want to be trying to get the decorating, shopping, cards, entertaining, cooking, cleaning and calling all done in December. So, I start early. Last year I did a lot of shopping in December and it was kind of fun to be in the rush - and I may do some of that this year, too - but I don't want to be doing everything last minute.

And we have the Christmas homes tour this year, so I'll be doing that the first weekend, and my open house will be the second weekend. Then there will just be one more until right before Christmas. It zips by quickly.

I am on a mission to move Thanksgiving to the end of September, which is really harvest anyway. Then we'd have Thanksgiving in September, Halloween in October and we'd start the Christmas season on November 1. I think it has great potential. And lots of people I mention it to like the idea. Of course, not everyone. Some people hate the holiday season, regardless of how long it it, and want nothing to do with extending it.

In other news today, I had lunch with Dorothy and it was a great talk. I agreed to be on the committee to consider developing wind energy here. And we had some fascinating conversation. I'm still mulling it over, but I will share more here soon.

Well, I'd best start going through the blog to amass the dreaded Christmas letter. Not sure there's much point these days when people could just read the blog, but I guess I'm in a transition phase.

Accidents and Nature

My brother, Jackie, recently featured here building an industrial strength Christmas tree stand for me, is in the hospital. He was helping with a construction job today and walked out on a board that broke, and he fell about 10 feet. The ball of his hip broke completely off, but he's expected to make a full recovery, with no loss of mobility. They will do surgery on Friday and on Saturday he will be walking. Wow.

Obviously, we'll all concerned about him, but thankful it wasn't worse and glad they can do something for him and that he will make a full recovery. Of course, in the meantime, he needs some serious pain killers and has to lay on one side in the bed.

Everyone has done a great job of keeping me informed. Cathy, Jim and Mary Ann all called me at various times today for updates, which I appreciated.

Before I knew all of this today, I took a few minutes for a nice walk at Dillon Nature Center. It was a lovely day, although it was NOT fall-like, as I mentioned I was looking forward to after yesterday's weather forecast. Weather people lie constantly. I swear, they must devote training to that.

It was supposed to be autumnal today. It was not. I know, because people were wearing shorts, no sweaters were in evidence, and I took a long walk outdoors in sandals. Not autumn.

On the upside, there were tons of bees and butterflies on these flowers they tell me are a kind of aster. They also tell me they multiply easily - that they planted about three of them. I think I need some. I like hardy plants.

Autumn and Honor

There is a harmony
In autumn, and a lustre in its sky,
Which through the summer is not heard or seen,
As if it could not be, as if it had not been!
                    Percy Bysshe Shelley



I snapped this photo of a spider web with leaves stuck in it at Quivira. I spotted two different webs built like this - rather hammock-like - in the crook of trees.

I picked an autumn quote because the weather people tell us that tomorrow is going to be a truly fall-like day. It's about darned time. I opened the windows a few days ago and decided now that it's officially fall surely I didn't need the AC anymore. There have been a couple of times I've almost broken down and turned it back on. It's time for fall now. I'm ready. I'm not a summer person. I want some autumn. Especially now that it IS autumn.

Global warming is starting to mess with my four distinct seasons and that ticks me off even more than future generations not having a planet left. OK, I'm exaggerating. A little. But I want my four seasons. Dammit.

But, they say tomorrow will be autumnal, before heat the rest of the week. Of course, these are the same weather people who predicted "brief showers in the morning, seventy degrees by noon" on the day I spent in pouring rain for 11 hours at Hillsboro when the temperature didn't get above 48. So, the fact that I believe them indicates incredible optimism or stupidity on my part.

I had lunch with Leah today and it was really, really nice to connect with her. She just lost her dad recently and we had not had a chance to talk, other than briefly. Some of Mark's friends have a morbid joke that I understand about "the club" and the club is made up of people who've lost a parent. It's called a coping mechanism. And, it highlights an important consideration - those who haven't been through it can't relate. They can try. But they can't.

I'm not sure, but I don't think anyone Leah works directly with has lost a parent. I know I've heard at least two of them refer to their parents so I don't think she has anyone in her direct world that can really empathize. And people who haven't been through it expect you to bounce back and get on with things very quickly.

Hello? Wake up call. It doesn't work like that. It was about five years after my mother's death that I came "out of the fog." I was functioning, and doing so very well by many standards, but internally I was a mess. No one knew that - not even me, really. God knows no one asked. People never want to ask. You might tell them and they don't want to hear. And it's largely a waste of your breath, anyway, because people cannot listen - it's too horrific for them.

So, today, Leah and I talked about those things that people not in the club don't/can't talk about. It was good for me. I hope it was good for her.

I've known that it's an honor to attend the dying. I'm not very good at that, and I'm thankful some people are. I'm blessed that my brother, Jim, was with our mom when she died, and he did all the things that needed to be done in those moments.

Today I realized it's also an honor to be with those on the other side of that process, who are experiencing the loss. I'm a little better at this part. A little better.

Quote of the Day

"Go where love has not yet arrived." Father Gregory Boyle

Father Boyle runs Home Boy Industries, which was created to hire people who are trying to get out of the gang lifestyle. It's controversial. And it's working.

Quivira National Wildlife Refuge

Quivira National Wildlife Refuge is one of my favorite places around here. It was established in 1955 and now has more than 22,000 acres.

There are 21 canals and other structures that divert water to 34 different wetlands - ranging in size from 10 to 1500 acres each - making  a total of more than 6000 acres of marshland, some of which I examined  on a previous trip. 

It's a big bird area. I've heard estimates that as many as 90% of migratory birds go through here over the course of a year. The bird pictured here is a very common one you see there.

Apparently, you can even see Whooping Cranes at Quivira - about 75% of the sighting in Kansas have been at Quivira or at Cheyenne Bottoms - as they migrate. Whooping cranes are endangered and the penalties are severe for killing one - a fine of up to $100,000 and up to one year in jail. There have been only five killed in hunting accidents since 1950.

However, considering how rare they are, five is substantial. Experts think that at one time there may have been as many 10,000 whopping cranes but in the winter of 1941-42 they were at an all time low of only 15-16. In 2005 they were up to 215. I think this year I'm going to try to see one. I've never been bird watching in my life, so I guess I might as well start with an endangered species there are fewer than 300 of.

Some things are plentiful - like ducks and geese...



There's plenty of other wildlife too. The other day I saw two different kinds of turtles - red eared sliders and this guy, which I don't recognize. I also saw snakes two different times from the car, a squirrel, deer, grouse and wild turkeys.

I like the opportunity to be surrounded by a different environment than what's right around Hutchinson, where I live. Quivira is only about a 30-40 minute drive away so it's easy to get to. I go down there a few times a year just to look around.

With all the wetlands, it's very different than right here.



I also walked the "Migrant Mile" trail I'd walked before, which is where I snapped this photo.



On the wildlife scenic drive, I spotted this tree, which I thought so perfectly illustrated the power of the Kansas wind for those of you who haven't experienced it. I've grown used to the look of trees that are growing bent because they've been bombarded by the wind from a young age. If you look closely, you'll see the horizon is straight - the tree really is that bent and it wasn't that windy of a day.



I saw this mix of plants on the hike over the migrant mile trail. I don't know what the puffy red stuff is and I couldn't get close enough to touch it. After getting bitten by a snake a couple of years ago, I don't wander out into such areas.



If you missed the snake bite saga of March 2005, go to http://patsyterrell.livejournal.com/2005/03/04/ and scroll down to the fence posts, then to http://patsyterrell.livejournal.com/2005/03/05/ to read all about it. Suffice it to say, I still have a little scar on my right ankle where fang marks once were.

So, I tend to stay on the trails now - you know, like all the signs tell you to do in the first place. And I watch where I walk much more carefully. I was very lucky in 2005 to have nothing more than some swelling, fever and tenderness at the location, and I think one snakebite gimme is probably all anyone is entitled to in a lifetime and I've already had mine.



I've talked before about the sound of the prairie. I took some video at Quivira the other day. I haven't had a chance to look at it yet, but when I do I may post some at you tube so everyone can hear the sound of the prairie. We'll see if it worked.